VIRAL
by InsaniumArtisan
Summary: Peace can be a hard thing to find. Even a harder one to handle. Sometimes, when it feels just in reach, it can slip through your fingers like dust. For every shred of hope there is an equal amount of despair, and for every fraction of good, there is the equal lament of bad. Up for adoption.
1. Prologue

**VIRAL**

**By: DraculaBleh**

Disclaimer:

This story spawned from reading far too many OCXCanon Wreck-It Ralph Fan-Fictions. Therefore, through a long struggle of writing, dodging time from a hectic schedule, snd just plain being "inspirationless", this was born. I attempted something before, but it didn't work out, so I place all my hope in this little baby. Everything aside, I do not own Wreck-It Ralph or any of it's affiliates. That belongs to Disney.

* * *

It was a peaceful day in Sugar-Rush.

The inhabitants of the land had gone back to their daily lives after the defeat of King Candy, no..._Turbo_, Vanellope had to correct herself for the hundredth time. Turbo had been in control, there was no "true" King Candy. Anyhow, after the defeat of the game-jumping ex-racer, Vanellope found herself in charge of the game.

No, not just _the_ game. Sugar-Rush was _her_ game. And now _she_was in charge, not Turbo.

President Vanellope von Schweetz, ruler of Sugar-Rush.

Though her duties as the new president tended to keep her sidetracked at times, the girl was always one to find time for her passion.

Racing.

It was ironic, really. That she and the previous dictator had shared the same love for racing, but their motives were entirely different. While Vanellope enjoyed to win, which was a lot, she never made a fuss if she dropped below first place. Instead, she'd grin, roll her eyes, and bid her opponent a "Good game."

This was their difference, the one thing that seperated the child from the monster, and for this, her compassion-her _control_, she was entirely thankful.

"Hey, Vanellope!" Adorabreezle Snowpop, one of the opposing racers she competed against, called to her from her race-kart. "Two chocolate coins says you can't beat me!"

"Oh yeah?" The glitchy princess snickered, flipping her hair playfully, "And why's that, Snow-Head?"

"I just installed a new graham-mechanism that doubles my engines speed! This time around, I'll be unbeatable!"

Vanellope grinned at the challenge. "You're on!"

* * *

Fix-It Felix Jr. was in an entirely different situation, however.

Unlike the friendly competition Vanellope was currently holding with her tormentor-turned-friend, Ralph found himself under undaunting stress as he rushed back and forth on the Nicelanders' building. He was wrecking the foundation faster than he'd ever remembeted before challenged by the skill the child controlling Felix held.

As quick as he was to destroy a section, the controller had Felix there in a heartbeat, hammer tapping awsy at a mile a minute.

Ralph admitted, this was the most fun game he'd had in quite a few rounds, besides that girl who believed Felix's hammer was for besting Ralph upside the head. He'd gotten a good smack or too until the kid had realized that wasn't it's purpose, and started using the tool correctly.

It had taken _forever_to get Felix to stop apologizing after that.

The only that had managed to put a breaker on the handyman's frantic sorries was Ralph dragging the tinier male to Hero's Duty, and handing Felix off to his wife, Sergeant Tamora Jean Calhoun. One swift lecture from the hard-edged female had quickly straightened up Felix's demeanor, thus relieving Ralph of his comrade cling-on.

And now it was almost the same, having Felix trailing him so closely that Ralph could still hear the echoes of his apologies bouncing around in his head. Felling defeated, he allowed the Nicelanders to scoop him up and toss him over the building's edge. He landed in the designated pile of brown slush with a large, "Oomph!", and the child playing made a victory pose as the screen flashed the word "WINNER" at the top.

Smiling to himself, Ralph stood up, brushed himself off, and got back into place, waiting for the next child of Litwak's Arcade to appear at the console.

* * *

Calhoun was getting restless.

Half of her crew was missing because of her player's rash actions, and the Cybugs were closing in on her ranks.

Lifting up her gun, she charged for the offending creatures, her battle cry echoed by that of her remaining team.

The first round of bugs went down easily, swarmed over by a dozen of their virus-infected brethren. Calhoun aimed and shot. Shot. Shot. Shot. Reloaded. Shot. Shot. Shot. Shot. Reloaded. It wasn't until the fifth reload did she realize how many of the Cybugs were still left, and how little of her team their was.

In fact, it was just her and the player.

Calhoun released a string of coded expletives under her breath, and turned back to her survivinv teammate, shouting words of encouragement. "Don't give up now, soilder! We've almost got 'em beat!"

The player didn't respond but instead whirled his...her, _whoever's_avatar it was around and began to run in the opposite direction. Calhoun blinked.

_'Coward.'_

She turned around to keep fighting, but by then she was surrounded. Her gun clattered uselessly to the ground as the Cybugs moved foward, practically cackling with delight at the thought of revenge on their former Harbinger of Death.

Calhoun's vision ran blurry, and she slumped down, hissing angrily as the screen above glared out, "GAME OVER".

_'Mod.'_

* * *

Throughout the arcade, various games held various players. Some of the children ran as young as five, and they seemed more content with the more classic games, such as Pacman. A few of the others, ranging from seven and up, jostled each other as they crowded to play some of the more "player-active" games, like "DDR" and "Mortal Combat".

There was so much peace, so much tranquility from each of the game sections that none of the character could doubt their feelings of confidence. Vanellope was Sugar-Rush's president, Ralph was the "Good Bad-Guy", and Calhoun, though she wasn't very happy, was busy with recuperating her soilders with a "Job well done."

The arcade was in complete bliss from the normalacy.

But the rest was to be short-lived. Because as Ralph steadied himself on the edge of the Nicelanders' building in his most current round, he noticed something.

There was a truck parked just outside of Litwak's Arcade. And plastered acros the side, in bright jagged letters, read "HANK'S INTERNATIONAL GAME IMPORTER".


	2. New Game, Not the Same

**Chapter One: "New Game, Not the Same"**

**Disclaimer:** Thanks for reviewing. I'm a horribly fickle person, so seeing reviews is one easy way to tie me down to a story and keep it going. Anyhow, I do not own Wreck-It Ralph. However, I do own "Moon-Blade", but I don't own it's theme song, _"Nishiki No Mai"_, by Vocaloids Gakupo and Gakuko.

* * *

The response to the new game was like a ripple throughout the arcade. It started off small, as word got around that Litwak had been seen signing for a large package outside. Of course, the source of the knowledge was Ralph, who had indeed recalled the event he saw at the "Bad Anon's" latest meeting; which was Litwak, standing outside, scribbling something onto a clipboard while two burly men wheeled a large wooden crate from the interior of the delivery truck.

"Guys," he spoke, unsure of whether to feel nervous or excited about this sudden change in routine, "I think we've got a new game."

"Oh?" Clyde asked, "Well, that's great news! Do you know anything about this new game, Ralph?"

"Uh, well..." Ralph scratched the back of his head nervously, trying to recall what he could about the memory, "The box it came in was...big. And the name printed on the side was..."Moon"...something-or-other."

"Oh no..." Dracula muttered, dragging a hand over his eyes, "I hope it's not the stupid "Harvest Moon" game. I don't think I could stand living in the same environment as those-those-!"

"Now, Drac," Clyde spoke calmly, "Isn't this the type of thing we're trying to overcome? The stereotype of dislike? How could you know you can't live with them when you don't even know them?"

Dracula made a face, but remained silent, knowing all too-well the little orange ghost was right.

"Even if it's not "Harvest Moon", how do we know it won't turn out to be, like, you know..."Higurashi"?" It was Bowser who spoke, his voice rough and gravelly. Though it didn't help his image as a frightening creature, he tried his best to keep his tone soft and unstarteling.

Everyone shuddered at the memory of the mentioned game. "Higurashi" had been a sort-of RPG game, in which the player tries to decode the culprit of a series of murders in a small Japanese town. It had been a huge hit with the older kids, at first, but was quickly shutdown weeks afterwards when they began to complain to Litwak about the games amount of violence, which greatly surpassed that of even Sergeant Calhoun's game.

Ralph held back a shudder as he reminisced about his last encounter with one of the game's inhabitants, a girl named Rena Ryugu. She had been under psychological control by the game's main antagonist, and had nearly chopped the wrecker's coding to bits in her brainwashed state. Luckily, the protagonist, a boy named Keiichi Maebara, had intervened in time.

Even so, every now and then Ralph found himself remembering that encounter, and how it always shook him to the core. Pushing that feeling of stale fear away, he cleared his throat.

"I don't know guys, I think it might just be a normal game. Nothing extreme, maybe, but not too soft either?"

Clyde beamed, "Ralph, your optimism gives me pride."

Satan snickered, "Well, if you're so sure of yourself, Ralphie, then why don't _you_go introduce yourself to the new game first?"

"I-uh-wha...?" Ralph stammered. "M-me, but how...why...?"

"Wha-hyu scaaaruuud?" Zombie groaned from his seat, lolling his head around to stare at the nervous bad-guy.

"N-no!" He stumbled over his words to speak. "It's just that-well, to be new...and suddenly have someone barge into your game...uninvited..it's rude, right?!"

Clyde seemed thoughtful of this fact, and his face suddenly brightened as it was stricken with an idea. "That's it, Ralph! That's exactly it!"

"What is?" The wrecker asked doubtfully.

"To just _"barge in"_! What's a better way of getting over a fear than to face it head on? Why not just go up, say, "How do you do? I'm Ralph, the bad-guy from Wreck-It Ralph, and I hope we can hang out together?" It's ingenious!"

Ralph opened his mouth to protest, but by then Clyde had gotten several of the other Bad-Anons on his side, until the entire room went up in a cheer.

"Wreck-It Ralph! Wreck-It Ralph! Wreck-It Ralph!"

His mouth shut like a steel bear-trap, and Ralph slumped in his seat, defeated.

_'Ingenious? Yeah, it sure is...'_

* * *

Passing through Game Central Station was always a hassle for the over-sized male, but he had to admit, the one thing he couldn't stand the most was...

"Name, game, and destination, please."

_'Bricks.'_

Heaving a sigh, Ralph kept a growl from escaping his clenched teeth. "Ralph. _Wreck-It Ralph_. Same as it's always been. My game is "Fix-It Felix Jr.". Can't you just let me through?"

The surge protector let loose a sigh that reflected his own. "I'm just doing my job. _Same as it's always been_. Why must you struggle against this every time we meet?"

Another sigh. "I'm headed to "Moon"..."Moon"..."

Bricks, he couldn't remember the name!

"Moon...?" The surge protector asked incredulously, raising a holographic eyebrow at the flustered wrecker.

"Th-the new game! The one that was just plugged in! I know it's "Moon"-something, but-Argh!" He pulled a massive hand over his spiked hair, "Just let me through!"

"I'm sorry, sir, but I can't-Hey!" The SP flickered violently as Ralph rushed past him, leaping over the gateway that led to the seperating game-tunnels. "You can't just-!"

He groaned as he watched him disappear down the dark pathways. "I really need a new job..."

* * *

The new game was settled in the far corner of the arcade, which meant it's tunnel was the farthest away from Game Central Station. Several times did Ralph consider turning back, but then he'd remember the looks of pure faith the other Bad-Anons had given him, and would press on.

It seemed like eternity had passed before Ralph finally reached the last gate. With a huff of relief, he fell tp his knees just outside the gate's opening. "This...is...it."

The portal to the new game buzzed and jumped violently, filled with a swirling vortex of red and violet. The sign above read '_Moon-Blade_' in bright crimson, jagged lettering, and the music that floated through sent a familisr chill down the wrecker's spine.

_"Now, dancing at the palace  
The shrine maiden of black hair and purple clothing  
Now, dancing at the palace  
The navy blue night and the golden fan_

_From within the sake cup, drink up the moon  
If the moon is captured, this fan is on the moon"_

Ralph gulped.

_This_was definitely not the "normal" he'd had in mind.

"Maybe I should just...", he cut himself off with a firm swing of his large arms, "No. No, I can do this. Just remember, "How do you do? I'm Wreck-It Ralph. How do you do? I'm Wreck-It Ralph..."

As Ralph disappeared into the twisting doorway, he failed to notice the gentle crackle of red pixels that circled around the mainframe of the portal. As soon as he vanished into the vortex, the coding jumped together, each fragment attracted to the next like a giant magnet, until the dots of red had formed the upper half of a body.

Through tired eyes, orbs of gold stared into the doorway, and watched the entering figure.

"Wreck-It...Ralph?"

* * *

**Note:**So, full Chapter is done. How's it so far? I'm sure right now you're like: "But...you said-Where's Turbo?!" Don't wrry, he'll be there soon. I just wantsd to estsblish some sort of relation with Ralph, since he is the main character of "Wreck-It Ralph". Also, I don't know whether or not Drscula is a part of the Bad-Anons, butbif he was a video-game character, I'm sure he would be. (If I got anyone OOC, don't be afraid to let me know.)

Read, Review, and Gain Another Chapter.

- DraculaBleh


	3. Encounter of a Most Unpleasant Sort

**Chapter Two: "Encounter of a Most Unpleasant Sort"**

**Disclaimer:**Once, again, thanks so much for reviewing. It's the only thing that keeps me from putting my projects on intensive-hiatus, reviewing is. I know the last chapter was a bit..."iffy", so I'll try my best to make this one clearer. Also, I do not own Wreck-It Ralph, or the mention of "George of the Jungle". I do own "Moon-Blade", and it's protagonist, Axe.

* * *

The first thing that Ralph noticed when he entered the game was it's darkness.

It wasn't a surprise compared to what one would see from the outer-portal, but it still unnerved him quite a bit. The virtual sky above was tinted a deep silvery-grey, speckled with flashes and streaks of opposing black and white within the twistng funnels of clouds. There was no sun, nor a visible moon around, and despite it's borderline thunderstorm atmosphere, the dry and rugged terrain appeared malnourished of any type of liquid.

The only signs of life Ralph could distinguish was the occasional stump of a cactus, breakimg out in a crooked pattern from under the rocky sand it grew upon.

It was a desert, lonely and desolate.

Desert-type surroundings usually gave the environment for a Western game, or a zombie/horror macabre adventure of some sort. Just the thought of it brought back flashes of Ralph's memory from "Higurashi", and he swallowed.

"H-Hello?" His voice broke with nervousness, and echoed across the barren sands.

A minute passed. Then two. Time ticked on, and with no answer, Ralph screwed his courage to a sticking place and spoke again, this time much more loudly.

"Hello? Is anyone here?"

He wouldn't normally have been scared, and shouldn't have been, since many of his Bad-Anon friends were for frightening than any sort of monster his subconscious could cook-up, but the receiving silence made him all the more anxious.

"Hello? _Hellooo?_"

From behind him, a sound answered. It was soft, hardly perceptible against the whistle of the wind that whipped around him, but it was still..._something._

A noise, scratchy and uneven, with sudden breaks and shuffles mixed in. It was the sound of sand being manipulated under heavy duress. It was the sound of stumbles and drags.

It was the sound of someone...some_thing_approaching.

Across the sandy plain, Ralph spotted a silhouette. It's body was large, even by standards of perception, and it's movements were sluggish and shifty. He couldn't make out a face, nor any definite form of whether or not it was a person...or something worse. The only thing he could feel was the deep hammering of his heart, beating against his ribcage like the wings of a hummingbird.

It inched closer, and with each nearing step, Ralph could hear the dry creaking of material, like rocks grating against one another.

"H-Hello?" He called nervously to the far-off creature. "Who's there?"

There was no answer, though the thing paused for a moment in it's footsteps.

"H-How do you do?" He tried again, waving one of his giant fists in the air as a sign of peace. The practiced words tumbled from his mouth in a jumble, and he rushed to spit them out. "My name is Wreck-It Ralph, and I'm from a video-game, like you. I was hoping that maybe we could be...?"

He trailed off, gawking up at the monstrosity that towered above him.

It was a rock..._thing_, of some sort. It's body shifted and rolled unceremoniously like an evermoving avalanche, speckled with a stretched array of granite-colored boulders across it's abdomen. The rock-creature's arms were nearly twice as large as his own, and the shards that created the digits were pinprick sharp, and obviously deadly.

Ralph swallowed and trailed his eyes up until they met a face, reflected several shades of a stony-grey under the severe flashes that arched out from the quivering mass of programmed storm-clouds above. The twist of white-hot lightning revealed to him a sliver-pair of rubies, embedded deep into the eyeholes of the giant's golemic facial structure.

Under normal circumstances, any other character would have run for the sloping hills. But not Ralph...not _"Wreck-It"_Ralph. He had been through a lot, and this was just another "stone in the bucket", mind the pun. He had come here with a mission, and he was determined to complete it.

To prove to himself, and others, that not all Bad-Guys were...well, _bad._

"H-...", he was cut off with a suddden violent cough, and cleared his throat to begin again. "Hi...I'm...I'm, uh, I'm Ralph. Actually, I'm "_"Wreck-It"_Ralph, but I actually prefer to be called Ralph." He waved his hands to gesture to himself, and the creature he spoke to made no movement of response.

"And I'm a video-game character-wait, I already said that, right? Ah-hehe, whoops." He chuckled anxiously and raised a hand to scratch at the back of his neck. The monster tensed, emitting a low sound from the deep, endless cavern that served as it's mouth.

Ralph froze in mid-movement.

"Well-what I'm trying to say is..._it's-nice-to-meet-you-let's-be-friends!" _He choked the words out, even faster than before, and squeezed his eyes shut, waiting for the creature's answer.

An unnerving stretch of stillness passed, broken now and then by the same resounding growl from before. Slowly, he cracked his eyes open.

And regretted it.

The golem's arm pierced the arm with the same speed as the lightning overhead, and swung down towards him in an arc not-too-different from his own "wrecking-style". Ralph made a squeaky noise of surprise and stumbled backwards, desperate to get away from the monster's oncoming appendage. He stepped back, readying himself into a running position...and pressed his foot directly onto the thorny wings of a mini-cactus.

Unintentionally, he yelped in pain and jerked violently.

The creature dropped it's rocky jaw open and unleashed a roar the broke out a tremor across the desert-floor.

Ralph turned, dug his throbbing foot into the sand, and pushed off. He darted across the plain faster than he'd ever imagined he could run. His "Fight-or-Flight" response pushed him foward, his being willed by pure adrenaline to keep running, keep running, keep running, despite the sting of the leftover barbs still stuck in his underfoot.

He could hear the monster lumbering after him, gangly and lurching, but with enough pent-up speed that it tailed close enough behind that Ralph could hear the groans of it's rocky body straining under it's duress. The sky rumbled and snarled with thunder, and with a final crack of lightning, the storm-clouds burst, unleashing a torrent of rain close to the intensity of a flash flood.

In mere seconds Ralph's once bone-dry clothes were soaked. Terrified, he whipped his head around wildly, searching for escape-any sort, just something, _anything_, to get away from the aimated pile of stones intent of crushing him into the sand dunes. To his right, there was a dot. Another golem, the thought struck his mind with an insane amount of fear, but as he stared harder, he notices it was too..._wonky_-looking to be another one of those things.

When realization struck him, he nearly sobbed with relief.

It was a cliff.

He twisted in his path, and made a beeline for the upwards climbing tower of red-stone. The rain beat down harder at this angle, but it failed to hinder Ralph's newest mission.

_"Mission "Meet-Someone-New?"_Failed.

_"Mission: "Get-the-Heck-Away-From-Someone-New?"_In-action.

The pain in his foot had died down by this time, and Ralph could feel his coding twitch incessantly as it attempted to patch up the tiny, yet annoyingly painful, wound. The golem lumbered closer, alarmingly so, and in a last attempt , the wrecker-in-distress shoved his foot into the drenched sands. The force of impact caused a tremor under his body, and Ralph tossed his body unwaveringly into the air, his arms thrown out behind him like a gorilla on the offense.

His body sailed towards the welcoming embrace of the crimson-stone skyscraper, and behind his rain drenched silhouette, a crack of lightning rocketed around him, such a blinding flash of fiery-white that he lost sight of his destination. His arms flailed out with no visual place of outcome, and he screamed for a brief second. It was a sound not unlike that from the old "George of the Jungle" game series, another shutdown series, that Ralph could hear the familiar jingle echoing in his head, the lyrics twisted in a parody of the original.

_"Ralph, Ralph, Ralph in the desert  
Watch out for that cliff!"_

And much like the original, Ralph found himself with a faceful of red-brick. His arms wrapped around both sides of the thin structure, while his legs shot out in a split-like position. He grunted as his body weakly peeled itself away from the red-brick and plummeted down. The dunes below him were wet and slushy, and when Ralph's body crashed into them, a brief feeling of déjà vu washed through him, and for a moment he expected the sky above to light up with the words "WINNER!".

But he wasn't in "Fix-It Felix Jr.", and the dizziness that buzzed across his head made his vision blurry. White dusted across his sight, and the weakness that overcame him made him feel helpless. His ears drowned in the roaring of the pounding rain, and through his glazed-over eyes he could make out the shifting movement of the clouds.

For a moment, they were the most beautiful thing he'd ever seen.

The last thing he'd ever see.

As he stared up, petrified and drenched in rain, a large shadow leaned over his fallen body. Under the fading glow of the silver sky, two red shards burned down...

Down...

Down...

* * *

**Note:**Chapter two: done. So, more action here, ja? I was going to make it longer, because I began writing it yesterday, but ...my Kindle trolled me. I had almost half of it done when my Microsoft Word app forced a shutdown on me. And erased everything I'd written.

Not cool.

Anyhow, I forgot to mention: but this, and half of chapter three will still be Ralph connected. _Then_, we'll get to Turbo. Sorry for this confusion!

Remember: Read, Review, and GaC.

- DraculaBleh


	4. Let's Meet Under the Moon

**Chapter Three: "Let's Meet Under The Moon"**

**Disclaimer:Thank you all who review, you rock my writing-world. And to my 'Meh!' Anonymous commenter (Who is actually my best friend/editor, another writer nere on FF: "I will hurt you for that one-word comment. I know where you live...sorta." Anyhow, I don't own "Wreck-It Ralph", or Turbo. I only own "Moon-Blade" and it's protagonist, Axe.**

* * *

_"Hey, Stink-Brain?_

_"Yeah, kid?"_

_"..." The glitch-turned-princess/president sighed, and rolled over onto her side to hide ger face from the wrecker. "Nah...it's nothin'."_

_"Vanellope?" Ralph grew alarmed at the uncharacteristic tone of exhaustion in her voice, and turned on his side to stare at the young girl. "What's wrong, kid?"_

_"Well...it's just..." She rolled over in the sugary field to face her oversized companion. "You remember...'bout Turbo? How he's 'sposed to be 'Gone for good.' and stuff?"_

_"Yes?" The wrecker replied, raising an eyebrow in consternation. "What about it?"_

_"Oh...I don't know...but sometimes, I just...I just..."_

_"Just what, Vanellope?" Ralph asked, feeling uneasy at her oncoming words._

_"I feel __**bad**__for him, Ralph. I mean, yeah, he was a total doodie-head, but there was just...when we were racing-", she began, staring upwards towards the sky. Ralph followed her gaze, and his eyes nearly popped from their places in his head. The programmed sunlight was shifting, deepening into a soft crimson twilight._

_"Kid, what's going on?" He asked, his anxiety building._

_Vanellope didn't answer. "When we were racing...Ralph, the __**look**__ in his eyes. It was...like having your code ripped apart bit by bit a hundred times over. He was mad, yeah...but, there was so much..." Her lower lip trembled, and tiny crystals rolled down her face. "__**Sadness.**__"_

_The wrecker was taken aback by the amount of sincerity in the child's voice. "Vanellope...?" He asked, his countenance beginning to waver to the same wavelength as hers._

_"See?" She answered, "I told you it was nothin'...just silly-talk, that's all!"_

_"Vanellope..." Ralph sighed, his voice laced with a soft paternity, "Do you realize what you're saying? I mean, c'mon! Just __**think**__ about everything he did! Remember how he __**did**__ tear up your code? Made you an outcast? How about him acting as a tyrant in a game that wasn't even his, and __**then**__trying to kill us all?!" Without realizing it, he had pulled himself onto his elbow, and slammed his left fist violently against the sugar-coated ground._

_The impact left a crater, and the next thing Ralph knew, Vanellope came hurtling down from the sky, and landed across his chest with a loud, "Oof!"_

_"What the fudge, Ralph?!" She spat. His jaw dropped at her candy-euphemised vulgarity. "Watch what you're doin', you...you Stinkbrain!"_

_The clarity of the situation hit Ralph in the face like a pile of bricks. And without warning, he began to laugh._

_It started as a soft chuckle, but as the situation grew he found it escalating more and more until he was wracked with a body-shaking guffaw. Vanellope peered down at him oddly._

_"What's so funny?"_

_In between gasps for air, he answered back. "I...this...everything! That was...I almost...and you-!" He broke off into laughter again, and Vanellope frowned. Her frown arched down deeper, while the sound of his off-beat cackles softened into something else._

_He pressed an oversized palm over his face, and rolled away from the miniature President. His shoulders still rolled, and his body shook, but the sound that emitted from his throat was the complete opposite of a joyful laugh._

_**'Is he...?'**__She wondered, and poked his back gently, just between his shoulder-blades. "Ralph...?"_

_"What?" He snapped, glaring back at her with a tear-streaked face._

_Vanellope flinched. "I...I'm-!"_

_The wrecker cut off her apology by slicing the air with his hand. "__**Don't**__ kid. Just...__**don't**__."_

* * *

Ralph awoke to the sound of fighting.

In his semiconscious state, no distinguishable forms could be seen, but the blurry outline of the rock golem was hard to miss. Two tiny dots, it's eyes, stabbed out of the darkness and cast an ominous red glow behind the thing that clashed with it.

Roars of anger blasted above him, and sent waves of neuronal pain through his coding. The roars repeated themselves, over and over, until they stopped abruptly, cut off with the sheen of metal and the resounding melodical tune of a feminine voice.

_"I thought I told you to __**shut up**__."_

The ground trembled with the sound of falling debris. It crumbled over Ralph's still form in an avalanche, hailing down like a meteor shower until the wrecker leapt up from his spot.

His vision cleared as he blinked, and instinctively, he swung his arm upwards. It collided with an oncoming boulder, and broke the giant rock into a smaller shower of fragments. Through the pebble-filled haze, a silhouette leaned back against the opposite side of the cliff he'd slammed into and whistled.

"Quite some strength you've got there."

The figure spoke in monotone, and from it's shadow, Ralph could see two forms escaping from a round segment on it's body. A head? Horns? Appendages? Whatever they were, they swayed back and forth with the blowing breeze, and with their movement, the soft tinkle of bells followed soon after.

Ralph stared at the person. "Wh-who are you?"

The person stepped out of the shadows.

Ralph stared.

A girl stared back at him.

She was of medium height, slightly shorter than Calhoun, and her skin shivered a deathly grey hue. She was skinny, almost alamingly so, but not enough to be considered completely without nourishment. Her face was heart-shaped, and from within it, two ruby red orbs sat. The clouds overhead crawled over the crescent of the moon, and the darkness slid over half of her face.

Without answering, she strolled past him to a section of crumbled stone, and he froze. Her forearm brushed his. An icy cold patch slipped over the place where her skin had touched his. Ralph shivered.

The sound of metal on rock clanged in his ears, and he whirled around, driven by instinct. _'Another one?'_

"No more Golems." The girl responded to his unasked question. She turned, and held out her hand. Ralph froze again, and prepared his legs to resume running.

In her grip, she held out a blade.

Not a sword, like he'd expected from the sound it gave off, but a hatchet-type weapon. Short, silver, and attached to a black handle, it was oddly designed. Not overly entricate, but not beaten down and shabby. It's condition was obviously stable, and the form of the blade swept over the wooden holding spot like a half...square? Or whatever, and two screws poked out from the place where the metal curled over the handle.

"This is "Christener"." The girl spoke, and the bells sounded again.

Finally, Ralph understood where they were coming from. Her hair, a chesnut brown, framed her forehead in rectangular-shaped bangs, and swept back into two enormous ponytails, one on each side of her head. The bands that held them together were decorated. With a pair of bells.

"Uh...uh-h-_huh_," Ralph stammered out, her cold visage reminding him all-too much of the red-haired psychopath he'd once called his "friend". But this wasn't Higurashi. And she wasn't Rena.

Suddenly, Ralph remembered his original reason for coming. He couldn't travel all the way back empty handed! He held no doubt in his mind that the amount of disappointment the Bad-Anons would feel for him...well, he knew them. And he knew it would take a while for them to get over it.

He forced his spine ramrod straight, and spoke. "My name is Wreck-It Ralph. I'm-"

"I know." She cut him off.

"What?"

"You're from the "Bad-Anons", and you want to be "_friends_", am I correct?" The girl spoke monotonously, but her eyes refused to leave his.

"I-um-yes! Yes, exactly!" He couldn't stop the soft laugh that came from his throat, and he coughed to clear it again. "So...uh...? How about you?"

She blinked.

He flushed and started again, "I mean-uh, who are you? I mean...your name, what's your name? And in your game, wait...maybe not, who-what-um, what I mean is-!"

The brunette snorted, but didn't smile. "Save yourself the trouble."

"W-what?"

She sneered. "I'm not interested in joining some little club for the "Emotionally Damaged Band of Villainous Misfits"." Ralph's mouth gaped open and shut like a fish, but the girl continued on. "And I'm not interested in "_friends_". The only use you've been to me so far is helping me to keep that Golem distracted long enough to steal it's Coding Spectre."

"It-", he found his voice again, "it's _what_?"

Nameless-Girl rolled her crimson eyes. "It's _Coding Spectre_. Don't you guys know _anything_about software modernization?"

Ralph blinked.

"I'll take that as a '_No_'." She dug into the pocket of her black leather-shorts, and from them, pulled out a small blue cube. It was nearly the size of a gumdrop rock, and twitched with strand after strand of numbers and symbols.

Coding.

"Wh-what's this for?" Mesmerized, Ralph stared at the object. "Is it...part of your game?"

The girl blinked, once, then answered, with a small hint of satisfaction. "It's coding. Of course it's part of my game, dim-bulb. I think that's what I'll call you. Dim-bulb."

"My name's Ralph." He grumbled.

The girl placed the cube back into her pocket. "Axe."

"It's in your hand."

Another sneer. "No, _Dim-bulb_. That's my name. Axe."

* * *

A section away from the conversing two, the air jumped and crackled. A swirl of coding, as red as the horizon that broke out over edge of the sky, twisted and curled in a tornado-like formation. It took on the same distinct pattern as it had outside the game's entrance, and once again the torso appeared.

But not completely like before.

The grey skin of the male glitched and shimmered with an uneven wave of red pixels. His red and white striped suit hung loosely off his malnourished form, and the golden orbs that had shined so brightly before sat in his face, sunken and bloodshot.

Turbo reached out towards the direction of the silhouettes and spoke, his voice broken and corrupted.

_"Wreck-It- $k-I* Ra-a-a-00%$$%..."_

His semi-stalke form twitched once, and burst back into a flurry of pixels. From within them, the eyes continued to glare outward, glazed with hatred and agony.

_"I wi-i-i-iiiiiIIIIiii-#%#&$-ll find you-u-u-uuuu...WwWwrrrRRRR-R-R-r-e-e-e-ey-#%$*...!"_

* * *

**Author's Note:**I apologize for this taking so long. I'm doing a few extracurricular activities that take up much of my time. Sorry. Anywho, this is the end of Chapter 4. I apologuze for stil BEING ON RALPH. Seriously, fudge you plot-bunny. Fudge you. Lkke I said, I will switch to Turbo...eventually. Aside from that: 1) I have acnew survey on my profile about this story. Would appreciate input. 2) I have a tumblr. It holds a drawing of Axe, if anyone's interested, I can send you the link. (She's a bit OOC in the picture, because it's based off an emotional song.)

I was also thinking of doing a second version of this story, with my OC's, but in an AU. I dunno.

If anyone has any ideas about what I could use in the story (Just brainstorms.), feel free to let me know.

Remember, R, R, and GaC!

- DraculaBleh


	5. Author's Note ((Mildly Important))

**AUTHOR'S NOTE**

This is just a little AN apologizing for my lack of updates. I would like to say a massive fudging "THANK YOU" to every who has Favorited/Followed/Reviewed this story so far. I love you all.

Slowly, but surely, I'm getting this done. The major hold-up is that my plot-bunny was suddenly hit by the song-fic bug, prompting me to currently abandon this stoty to work on a one-shot.

A LONG one-shot.

To show you how seriously I'm into this thing, I've prepared a little preview for you all.

Enjoy.

* * *

_Click._

_Click._

_Click._

The soft noise repeated itself, echoing the dull ticking of the clock above.

The king tapped his arching claws against the candy frame of his throne impatiently. The chair faced an open-curtain window, and through the sugary panes he could see the other characters of his game running, jumping, playing together.

He snorted, revealing a mouthful of jagged fangs. Is this what they called friendship? Pah, it was irrelevant. Wasteful. Ignorant. And most of all...unnecessary.

Truly, to be king, he had to stone his heart. The one etch of coding in him that longed for the chance to "_play_" again, as a racer, zooming across the track until he and his cart were mere blurs with the scenery undetectable and unbeatable.

But those days were far over.

For a moment he allowed his eyes to travel over his distorted form. Half-King Candy, half-Cybug. Full game jumper. He hardly knew his own name anymore. His title, combined with the numerous "nicknames" given to him across the kingdom, hardly made a difference to him.

But who was he now, that made him so different from back then?

The laughter and childish chatter stopped so abruptly that King Candy's head snapped up in an involuntary swivel. Outside the window, the children were still gathered together. Rancis and Taffyta stood close, while Adorabreezle shared a spot with Minty, Caramella, Swizzle, and a few others. Their speech had slowed to an indistinguishable whisper, and even with his advanced hearjng, Candybug still strained against the window to pick up their words.

"The glitch!" Taffyta gasped, shifting her lollipop to keep it from slipping from her mouth.

"It's here...what...doing...?" Rancis muttered, his sentences lined with gaps.

"Doesn't belong..." Caramella sneered.

_What in sweet Sugar Babies...?_ The corrupted king thought to himself, rubbing the sugar-coated pane to take a better glance at the child before him.

She couldn't have been much older than the other children, a maximum of ten, at the least. She stood, isolated, outside of the ring of racers, her deep raven hair frosted with bits and pieces of different candies. She stared at the others as they backed away, her expression one of unmasked hurt. King Candybug tapped his hand curiously against the window surface, intrigued by this newcomer.

Who was she?

Where had she come from?

_And, _the king thought to himself, watching the children back away, _what was her condition that made his subjects hold so much disdain for her?_

* * *

Get it now? This isn't even the beginning. Seriously, it's pumped by my favorite Vocaloid song: "The Beast" by Miku Hatsune ((Or the Len Kagamine append.)), so I hope you see how into this I am. Trust me, I'm still working on the next chapter for VIRAL, but most of my time is into this.

Thanks for your support~! ((Check out my Forum and my tumblr!))

- DRACULABLEH


	6. Virus

**Chapter 4: "Virus"**

**Disclaimer:** Sorry this took me so long. I'm also working on a two-shot at the moment, and writing on a Kindle takes time. A lot of time. But I'm getting this done, bit by bit. In other words, I don't own Wreck-It Ralph or it's characters. I only own Axe and "Moon-Blade". ((Haven't I made that clear enough?)) Also, guess who FINALLY saw Wreck-It Ralph? Yeah, me. So very happy.

Seriously.

Anyway, I have one half of the two-shot done, and would love feedback on how it is so far.

Enjoy.

* * *

"Y-you've got to be kidding me!" Ralph stumbled back, away from the brunette his words were directed towards.

"You mean you...actually _take_ the coding of other characters in your game? Just like that?" He waved his hands emphatically to punctuate his point.

"What _are_ you? Some kind of _monster_?"

The more he thought about it, the more he worried if this girl was going to turn out like King Candy...Turbo...whoever he was! If she was anything like him, then she was bad news. He had to get out of the game as fast as he could, to warn the others.

He turned to run...and froze when a weapon blocked his way.

Axe didn't blink as she stared the wrecker down. "You really do jump to conclusions, don't you, Dim-bulb?"

"My name...is _Wreck-It Ralph._" He growled. If he was going down, it wasn't going to here, and certainly not by _her_.

Without warning, he tossed his arm backwards. It slammed into Axe's side. _Hard._ It didn't hurt as much as she'd expected, but it caught off her off guard, and she flew through the air, knocking head-first into the same cliff Ralph had previously fsce-planted into.

A cloud of sand and dust exploded from the spot, suffocating the wrecker in a gritty haze. He coughed, eyes stinging. His throated burned in the sandy hail, and with one slice of his hand, the cloud split, creating a hole for fresh air to seep through.

Ralph gasped, inhaling the sweet air just as greedily as he'd accepted the chocolate lake he'd fallen in after Turbo's confrontation. But where was Axe?

Was she gone?

His answer came in the flashing silver of a blade hurtling through the air. He ducked with a yelp, and the knife flew over his head, barely grazing the stand-up tufts of his hair. He stayed low, watching a dark silhouette emerge from the dust storm, eyes like ruby beacons through the grain.

"I'm _not_ going to hurt you."

"And why should I believe that?" Ralph retorted, standing to brush the remnants of the sand from his overalls.

"Will you stop and _listen_ for a minute?" Axe muttered, stepping forward. She lifted her left arm in a beckon, and Ralph only had a split second to slam back to the ground again as the blade whizzed over his head a second time.

She tucked her weapon into it's holster and turned back to him, watching as he clambered from the dirt again. "That _thing_ was not a character. It was a golem. One of the illusions created to attack travelers in this desert."

Ralph blinked, then made a face, his nose scrunched and his mouth skewed. "Wha...?"

The brunette sighed, and ran her fingers through her bangs. "This is the Illusion Desert. And just like it's name, it gives shape to whatever the traveler most fears. The golem was a decoy, to test you. But the question is-", she broke off, boring her eyes into his like she could see straight into the center of his coding, "-what IS your greatest fear?"

A beat passed. Two, and Ralph felt his throat run dry. "I-I-you know what? I'm outta here. I tried to come by, tried to be nice-but you know what? Forget it! Forget everything!"

He turned, heading for the exit, when a force slammed into his stomach so hard he was tossed backwards. Axe looked up as the male flew by her, brows set in an angry impression. "So _this_ is your fear..."

A noise, somewhere between a screech and a banshee's wail pierced the air, and Ralph groaned as he sat up, spitting the sand from his mouth. "What the-"

Above them, a giant creature rose up from the dunes. Tall, but stocky. Long black hair. A tell-tale impish grin.

Ralph gaped up at the beast. "V-Vanellope?"

The monster roared, unfurling it's body to reveal the Cybug's body underneath. A Cybrid-Vanellope. The one thing that Ralph feared the most. His best friend, turned into-into one of _them_.

A massive clawed hand slammed down into the spot...where Ralph had _previously_ been standing. Axe shook her head, eyes narrowed as she pulled herself off the larger male. "Get out of here. I'll hold it off."

"Wait," he forced, "you said this thing was an illusion, doesn't that mean it can't-"

"It _can_ kill you, and it will." She responded, backing him up a bit so that he stepped closer to the entrance portal. "This illusion is just as solid as the golem, and it only lives for the kill. That's why this desert is here, to pick off the weak."

"I'm not weak." He growled, cracking his oversized knuckles.

"Obviously." She stated. "I doubt you'd have made it through the door if you hadn't have been. But-if you _die_ in this game, you won't regenerate, remember?"

Ralph nodded, then stopped backing up. "Wait, how do you know that? You guys have just been plugged in, how could you possibly know about-"

The Van-brid screamed, and threw it's body at them in a wild flurry of legs and candy. Axe shoved Ralph back. "Get out now!" It wasn't a request.

The wrecker stumbled, and tripped across the sand until he flipped, literally, onto his back just outside of the doorway. The odd twisting clouds from before were gone now, and Ralph could see the Van-brid melt back into the dunes, Axe's weapon embedded in it's chest.

She walked forward and expelled the coding cube, placing it into her pocket before she turned to face him. He glared at her, waving his arms to gesture his words. "I'm going now! But I _will_ be back-and when I do-I want answers!"

They locked eyes, and he kept it that way, even until he hit the tram. Ralph tripped and landed on his bottom in the tiny car. Were these just installed? They would've been a lot more useful in the beginning!

The tram pulled off, and from behind him, Ralph heard a voice echo. He turned to see Axe peering at him through the doorway, her expression relaxed. She looked him directly in the eyes and mouthed one sentence that sent a shudder down his spine.

_"Don't come back."_

* * *

Axe snorted as she watched the guy being towed away in the tram. Answers? If that's all he was after, it was going to take a while for that to happen.

The sand behind her shuffled, and she stood ramrod straight. "You might as well come out now."

Red. Red pixels everywhere. The buzzed around her in a whirlwind, before assimilating together. The top half of the group formed the upper half of a body, and Axe stared into the male's darkly rimmed eyes with disinterest.

"Who are you?"

The stranger grimaced at the cold tone of her voice, his form flickering between his words._ "I a-a-a-am T-uuuuuuurboo0000#%$%'-the greaaaa444AtTeee333st rac%#$#r eveeee####-!"_ Axe put a hand over his mouth to silence his warbling.

He tore away from her hand in disgust, and sneered._ "Wwwh00000 a-a-aAA!?Arrr-re y-o-000uu?"_

"Axe." She replied. She seemed unfazed by his appearance, and Turbo tilted his head at the odd girl, feeling his body glitch a little in a flash of red.

_"W-w-w-w-w-w-w-"_, he sounded stuck on repeat, his head jerking with each syllable. Axe sighed and conked his helmet gently with her blade. He jumped.

_"D-d-d-dooo000n'tTt Ttto0ouch-ch-ch Me-e-e-e-3333_!" He snapped, baring his teeth. They matched his eyes, the same lucid golden color.

Axe withdrew her hand. She wasn't sure if she could handle two jumpers in one day, especially since this one appeared at have problems with his coding. "Quite a virus you've got there."

_"V-v-v-v-VIiiruuuUus?" _He hissed. "_W-w-what dooo00 yo0ouu mea-a-An by viiiI111russsss?_"

She snorted, an unbreakable habit. With disinterest, she turned from the hostile male-Turbo, or whatever his name was, and began to make her way back across the dunes to where the broken shards of the golem lay. The rocks had already begun to wither away, becoming the desert once again. She didn't have time to deal with smart-aleck sass talkers. And she didn't want to.

_"Heee33y_!" He shouted after her. His body glitched and flickered down the path she was taking, his bursts short and flashy, while she took long, calm strides. Turbo glitched behind her and grasped her wrist. "_HEY_!"

Without caution, the red pixels rolling through his arm in a jumbled mess leapt upwards, clawing their way up her arm in a frantic mass. The corrupted coding managed to worm it's way up to her elbow, when a suddenly coil of bright blue sliced through them. The two codings fought, but only for a moment, as the blue battled the red back to where Turbo's palm sat. The crimson pixels snapped into his hand like a whip, and he recoiled in shock.

_"W-w-w-whAaaaAt in prrrrrogrrrramm333erssss...?_" He tumbled out. Axe yanked her arm away.

"Leave here." She snarled, her eyes glinting dangerously in the moonlight. "Now."

Turbo's body bristled in a wave of red. "_Nooo00t untiii11l yoo0ou te3eell mee3 whaA4t's go01ng 0on_!"

Another snort. "I don't have to explain anything. You came into MY game. All explanations are mine and mine alone, you-"

She froze. "It's heard you. Get down."

"_Wha44t_?"

Axe sighed and dug the Coding Spectre from her pocket. Her nails scraped the surface of the cube, pulling a few rolls of blue coding from the outer edge of the object, to where it floated in her palm, shapeless.

She held it out to him. "Eat this."

"_No_." He hadn't meant to say it, but it was his first reaction to having anyone attempt to force him to do something. And it was coding. Pure, raw coding, compacted into a square, and sitting in the hand of the most stubborn girl he'd ever met.

Next to the glitch.

He watched the girl's eyes flicker from him, to the symbols in her hand to the cube then back again. The ruby sheen in her eyes weirded him out, he wasn't afraid to admit. She looked like a freak.

After a while of watching her stare at him, his eyes drifted back to the coding in her hand. It jumped and coiled around aimlessly, like a worm. Glowing blue in her hand, it was almost like she was cupping a palm full of stars. Suddenly, she closed her fist, and the blue disappeared. The glow faded in her clenched palm, and she lifted the cube of coding to her lips.

Her teeth enclosed around the square and Turbo watched her mouth suddenly become illuminated by the same blue that was in her hand. He glitched back a bit, eyes widened in pure shock. Didn't she realize what ingesting that much raw coding could do to a character's schematics? For a moment, he thought not, until he saw that, in fact, the girl was NOT ingesting the code, but holding it in her mouth.

Her cheeks puffed out a bit at both sides as the symbols in her mouth jittered in captivity. Axe sucked in a breath through her nose. The sand beneath her feet shifted. The desert had detected the stranger, and was re-initiating it's job as a level. Bring to life the player's most inner fears.

Axe knew she had to disguise the grey-skinned virus, and fast. So she did the only thing she could think to do.

She grabbed the male by the face, and smashed her face to his in the most clumsy parody of a kiss she could muster. His mouth dropped in paralysis, and the code burst from her mouth and into his system.

Axe leapt back as Turbo swung out with both fists, his eyes blazing fiercely. "_W-ww-w-w-w-whaaaaaaaaaA4444-?!_"

Before he could begin a tirade of what the brunette knew would consist of cleverly hidden curses and insults, he doubled over, the red pixels of his body literally shrieking as her games' coding worked it's way through hid system. His body glitched violently, from red to blue, red to blue, wave after wave, red to blue, until he slumped into the sand, face-first.

He groaned weakly, exhausted from the force it took to write a sliver of her game's coding into his system. Turbo's body still occasionally twitched, but the glitches had died down to subtle shudders. Where an uncoordinated jumble of endless crimson symbols once sat, now lay a crumpled pair of legs. The legs led up to a lower abdomen, the abdomen to a chest, and so on, his entire body clothed in an oddly colored red and white outfit.

Upon his collapse, the helmet he wore had shifted, revealing a tiny mop of jet-black hair. Axe stared at the unconscious game-jumper for a moment, before her head snapped up, bells jingling with the wind.

The night had faded and in it's place, a crimson dyed sun arched across the desert's horizon. With it's coming, the ground under her feet trembled with the sound of approaching footsteps.

Soon, sooner if she didn't hurry, the King's men would be on them. Axe sighed, and scooped the smaller male into her arms, surprised at how heavy he actually was compared to his appearance.

She turned, weapon in holster, coding in pocket, and unconscious ex-racer in arm, to begin the long trek back across the desert to her home.

Axe was unable to see the cerulean pools her eyes reflected.

* * *

**Author's Note:** Finally! The delivery of another well-deserved chapter! Took a while to write. Took longer to think about. Anyway, let me know how it is. AND PLEASE CHECK OUT MY TWO-SHOT. IT TOOK ME ABOUT A WEEK JUST TO WRITE PART 1!

Aside from that, a reviewer asked me to "Make Turbo Nice". As much as I would LOVE to coat this adorable little guy in a big ol' bucket of OOC, my code as an author forbids it. It's one of the ten writing commandments:

_**#?: Thou shalt not make characters OOC.**_

And, look-nobody likes a molasses-hat Turbo, but he wasn't a very nice guy in the movie was he? No. He was the bad guy. The adorable, lispy, Turbo-Tastic bad guy. So for the while being, that's how he'll stay. Once again, I apologize but am highly flattered that you enjoy my story!

Remember: R, R, and GaC!

- Draculableh


End file.
